OER Guidance for Schools

Open Education Resources. Open Educational Resources (OER) are learning materials (including presentations, revision guides, lesson plans) that have been released under an open licence, so that anyone can use, share and build on them for free. Many openly licensed resources are available for schools to use and develop – but many schools are not familiar with open licensing and OER.

At a time when schools increasingly work with and rely on digital and web based materials, understanding how copyright works, and making the most of all available resources, is essential for staff and schools. Creating Open Educational Resources allows schools connect and collaborate with others through sharing work. Sharing can also help promote the great work school staff and schools are doing.

Leicester City Council has given permission to the 84 community and voluntary controlled schools across the city to create and share Open Educational Resources (OER), by releasing the learning materials they create under an open licence. By default, the rights of work created in the line of employment are assigned to the employer, unless a specific agreement has been made. This permission makes sharing resources simpler for everyone at these schools. All schools in the city have been provided with information about the permission. You can download a zip file containing the notification of the permission and an accompanying briefing note which provides more information about what the permission means for community and voluntary controlled schools in the city. Also included are two model school policies – one for community and voluntary controlled schools where the local authority has already provided permission and one for schools where the governing body, as the employer, provides the permission. All four documents are provided in Word and in PDF.